Many readers may not realize that authors Harper Lee and Truman Capote were childhood friends. Next March 2016, author G. Neri is releasing a middle-grade novel about their unique friendship.
The children’s book called Tru and Nellie, is being published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books for Young Readers. According to the author, Capote and Lee shared a common admiration for Sherlock Holmes and Rover Boys mysteries. As adults, they were said to often inspire each others writing projects.
Here’s more from The New York Times: “Ms. Lee drew on their friendship in her portrait of the characters Scout and Dill in To Kill a Mockingbird and in her newly released novel, Go Set a Watchman. Mr. Capote based the brash, sharp-tongued tomboy Idabel Thompkins in his debut novel, Other Voices, Other Rooms, on Nelle. They worked together on Mr. Capote’s true crime book In Cold Blood, then drifted apart after Mr. Capote failed to credit her properly.”
